LBE 2014 WINTER TRAINING IS UNDERWAY!

LBE 2014 WINTER TRAINING IS UNDERWAY! 

Greetings from Aiken!  The Lilybridge snowbird crew is settled and well into winter training at our winter base at Southern Cross Farm.  The horses are settled and happy, and enjoying the warm weather (relatively speaking) in Aiken.

Jenn Cain is graciously holding the fort down at home with ten horses, and I am so thankful for her efforts keeping all horses safe and sound in what sounds to be miserable weather!

Jen's View After the Last Storm!

I'm pleased to have Tori Kager down for a second year in Aiken managing the horses along with Annelise Aurillo.  While Tori has been working with me for the past year full-time, Annelise is taking advantage of a long winter break from school to immerse herself in training down here.  Both girls brought their horses with them to get geared up for the competition season, and they have made great progress in just two weeks!

Tori is eagerly training for her intermediate move-up in a few weeks with her mare Callie, with whom she rounded out last season with a top ten placing last fall in both of their first one star.  We have been steadily working on learning the intermediate dressage movements to prepare Callie confidently.  They have jumped a few times and we've even fit in a cross country school.  Tori and Callie are looking ready to tear up the track at Pine Top!

Annelise is working diligently on building her partnership with Rasher, her OTTB prospect acquired last fall.  Rasher is very green so we are taking our time with him, but Annelise's patience is paying off as he is improving every day!  He shows the potential to be a top horse for the sport, so we will continue on the slow-and-steady plan to keep him progressing confidently.  He has had a cross-country school as well, and to say that he can jump is an understatement!

There's a lot of sunbathing going on at the farm! 
Here Bucky is enjoying his daily afternoon nap.

For my competition horses, I have Bucky, Missy, Paddy, Parris and Gideon down here in training.  Each of them (except for Bucky) are looking at a move up in their respective levels this spring, so I have been working hard on their preparation.  Boyd and Silva have been helping me with them, and we will continue to work in the coming weeks to get them all ready for their starts at Sporting Days and Pine Top!

Here are some recent videos of Paddy and Gideon getting tuned up for their upcoming events!

Silva has been schooling Paddy up to the intermediate moves ... He's looking pretty fancy!

Here's Gideon schooling at home ... What a jumper!

Also joining us for winter training are Melissa and Bo, Julie and Merry, Cap, Stonewall, Mimi and our super prospect Henry!  The competition season starts next week as Kaelen Speck and Regal Dancer join us to compete at Full Gallop.  We are looking forward to having Hannah Daneker in Aiken with us next weekend as well to get some riding in with Cowgirl.  We also welcome Joy Atwell's young gelding to the program, as he will be arriving at Southern Cross Farm tomorrow for some training!

We also have Henry, a 9 year old 16.2 hh TB gelding offered for sale.  He is a cute mover, great jumper, has an amazing  temperament, and is ready to excel in any discipline you'd like! 
He is currently located in Aiken.  Please check out the website for his full sales listing!

Henry

Stay tuned for more updates, pictures, and all the fun!